As Ridgewood-based Forget Me Not Foundation grows, it touches more lives

Melissa and Dave Barry of Ridgewood, whose daughter Emma Grace was born still five years ago, created the Forget Me Not Foundation in memory of their daughter.

Emma Grace Barry never drew a breath, never got to feel the touch of the parents who briefly cradled her in their arms, nor to meet her older brother Andrew, then just a toddler, or the two younger brothers that would join the family in the years ahead.

But Emma — who was born still on Aug. 11, 2009 — has nonetheless touched many lives. And she will never be forgotten.

The foundation supplies support and items such as a memory box, below, for grieving parents.

In addition to Melissa and Dave Barry’s commitment to celebrating their daughter’s birthday every year, the Ridgewood couple started the non-profit Forget Me Not Foundation in Emma’s memory. Its mission is to support families who have lost babies during pregnancy, childbirth or shortly after birth, and to help educate the medical community about the emotional needs of families who suffer these losses.

The Barrys have achieved much on both fronts in the four years since their foundation’s inaugural "An Evening to Remember" fundraiser.

"We just had this idea that we wanted to help people who went through a similar experience as us, losing a pregnancy or a newborn baby, but we didn’t really have any specific goals. We just knew we wanted to help people," Melissa Barry says of that first benefit. "So, we had the fundraiser and it was a great success, and we made some money, and we were like, ‘OK, so now what do we do?’ We met with some people at Hackensack [University Medical Center] and had some conversations and figured out some ways to best help these families. And what we found was that a lot of hospitals don’t have the bereavement materials that they need."

Among the materials that the foundation donates to area hospitals are little white "memory boxes."

"We have in them forget-me-not seeds — so they can plant them and forget-me-not flowers will grow in their yard — and a little ring that they’ll put on the baby’s finger and then usually the mom wears it around her neck," Barry says. "And we put in a little tulle bag, so they can put in a locket of hair and bring that home.

"And then we donated a digital camera and printer and we give them memory cards, so the nurses or the family can use the camera, take pictures of the baby and the parents with the baby and then they can just give them the memory card to take it all home," Barry says. "So, they can print a couple of pictures, but really, we give them the memory card so they can feel like they can take as many as they want. That was one of our biggest regrets, that we only have one picture [of Emma] and there’s no picture of us holding her. So, I want to make sure that they take as many pictures as they want."

Their outreach started at Hackensack University Medical Center, where Emma was born still, because of a nuchal cord accident around 36 weeks, a month shy of her Sept. 10 due date. Barry, a pediatric cardiology nurse at HUMC, had had a "fine pregnancy," but one night, she suddenly became aware that the baby had stopped moving. At the hospital, a nurse using a Doppler monitor could not find a heartbeat. After an ultrasound confirmed the worst, Barry went through 18 hours of induced labor, knowing that her baby would not be born alive. Emma came out with the umbilical cord wrapped tightly around her neck, but otherwise, a perfect-looking baby.

"The care was great," Barry stresses. "As a nurse, I empathize with how hard their job is when the nurses have a situation like ours, because it’s like, no matter how many times they do it, which is unfortunately a lot, it definitely doesn’t get any easier for them. That’s why we dedicate a lot of the funds to training them, because that way it helps them know what to say, what to do, what not to do, what not to say, but it also helps them take care of themselves, ’cause it is hard. And the nurses are so grateful for this training."

The FMN Foundation also helps to educate hospital staffers — nurses, social workers, pastoral care and others who work in labor and delivery and NICU — in the metropolitan area.

More training

After their first fundraiser, in October 2010, the foundation sent two nurses from HUMC to the International Perinatal Bereavement Conference in Washington, D.C., "just kind of to get them there to get them excited about making change," Barry says. "And then the following year, once we learned more about how to better educate the staff, we sent 20 nurses, social workers, all different health care providers to this three-day bereavement training program at Good Samaritan Hospital in Suffern [N.Y.]." It was run by Resolve Through Sharing, a nationally recognized bereavement care and education training program.

"And then last year, we actually hosted it at Hackensack, because we were able to educate more people by hosting," Barry says. "We ended up having over 50 people from all over New York, New Jersey and Connecticut come to the training at Hackensack, so it was really great."

Krys Toczylowski, clinical nurse specialist in the NICU at HUMC, who calls Resolve Through Sharing the "standard of care" throughout the country, said, "I’ve been working at Hackensack for over 15 years, and we’ve always had a bereavement program in the past, but once Melissa and her husband got involved with the Forget Me Not Foundation, they’ve really kind of spearheaded and organized and allowed our staff to go to educational programs to learn about what is the optimal way to care for families who have a perinatal loss."

Some HUMC staffers have become coordinators and are planning another perinatal bereavement education program at the medical center in October, which is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month, Toczylowski says.

"An Evening to Remember" continues to grow. This year’s event, on Oct. 23, will be held at The Venetian in Garfield.

"Last year, we moved it to the Venetian, because the year before it was just too big," Barry says. "It’s a great problem to have."

Since the tragedy, the Barrys have had two more sons — William, soon to turn 3, and Henry, who just turned 1.

Birthday trip

Andrew is now 6 1/2, and very much aware of his sister’s upcoming birthday.